The memoirs of my day vacation: The Mayhem

So after the chaos came the mayhem. This is the time where the chaos morphs into shenanigans.

Did you miss Part 1 of this post? Check it out here.

We get on the road for our little day vacation. Wait. My nephew has no clothes to change into. My middle kid has no CLEAN bathing suit (as if we are going to have time for swimming now). I need a new camera because these iProducts suck at picture taking concerning lighting, pixels, and speed. The Canon Rebel we own is having battery issues ever since the children gooed it with schmooze (isn't that what attacked the My Little Ponies? I need flutterponies in my house stat). Plus the Canon has a lighting issue I can't troubleshoot. Then the thing I bought since then sucks ass, like I paid 50 dollars for something that works like those old school key chain cameras you could by for 5 dollars (or a Go Diego digital camera). Diet Coke. I need Diet Coke for the hotel room because how much you want to bet they decided to sleep with Pepsi like every hotel out there?

I go to Walmart. I make the husband drive the kids through BK for their dinner while I run in and grab shit. I grabbed boxers, shorts, t-shirt, and socks for the nephew. Bathing suit for the middle kid. Camera of awesome for my husband and I. Diet Coke for me. Shit now I'm hungry and I told the hubs not to get me anything, so I grab a sub and cheesesticks and wedges (waiting 20 minutes for 5 people to do closing duties first telling me they'll be with me in a minute because that's Walmart Customer Service at its finest). I go to pay, and I see my nephew. He walked all over the store looking for me, now he has to find the husband and kids who came in the store. After verbally assaulting my husband's common sense in front of Aisles 1 through 6 with a colorful vocabulary, and then sitting at a bench for 20 minutes, I see my nephew return. They went back to the car.

Husband was an ass and got me eating and driving.
Notice my safe procedure of driving with my knee?
10 and 2. Hands should be on the 10 and 2.

We finally leave. Finally. I'm driving because you'll see why in a minute.

I get an hour east before I get pulled over by Carl Winslow. He asked me if I knew how fast I was going. Of course, I had no flippin clue. I told him that I was listening to my kid talk and Michael Jackson's Billie Jean was playing and I was getting jiggy with it at the same time. I even turned up the volume of the CD player to prove it. Billie Jean. That explains everything. He asked me 5 more times if I knew how fast I was going. No. I don't know. According to him, I was ONLY going 81 in a 55. And I quote him, thrice, "You. SMOKED. Me.!"

I thought this was Derpy enough to post.
I'm too sexy for my Carolina Whopper my husband ended
up getting me.

You smoked me. YOU SMO-OH-KED ME!

You. Smoked. Me.

That would explain why I was driving listening to Billie Jean shaking my ass trying to figure out what my 6 year old was saying and then I looked in my rear view mirror and could barely see a car with flashing lights on it, like I had to squint my eyes to make sure I wasn't seeing the reflection of someone's LED headlights invented in hell hitting someone's brake lights a certain way with the atmosphere spreading it out and bouncing it off a tree. No, it was an actual police car. I'm so observant to notice him before he got here. If more people would pay this much attention on the road and pull over for emergency vehicles like this... And I even thought to myself, "Oooh, someone must be in trouble, or they are going to be in trouble." So I pull over to let him through. No. He was trying to catch up to me. I was probably fleeing from the police for a couple miles.

Well. This isn't good is it? And I haven't had a ticket in like 6 years. 81 in a 55, now that can't be cheap. Shit. This is gonna suck, but I'll take it like a man, no, I'll take it like a whore.

Then he asked, "Where are you heading?"

Well shit.

Mind you, Saturday, the day before, when I was taking food to my mom, I was driving behind some guy on this road going about 3 miles over the limit and a state cop was coming toward us, does a u-turn and flashes his lights, so I thought I was getting pulled over. I start to pull over thinking he's not going to believe that I'm taking food to my sick mom, watch. Then he went around me and pulled over the guy in front of me. I wasn't about to pull over make sure I wasn't part of the deal. Nope. I kept going. Just like Dory says, "Just keep swimming."

So this time, I don't have such a good story. Nope. No sick mom. No dying grandma (like that one ticket I got in Ohio in 1998), no uncle's funeral (the one I got in Ohio in 1999, they really don't give a shit in Ohio).

Figured I'm best off to go with the truth. The first time the kids caught wind of where we were going.

"We're heading to Pittsburgh. Planning to hit the zoo tomorrow and then watch the Steelers practice."

The cop, Carl Winslow (without the mustache), was like, "Oh really. Well then, I guess I won't give you a ticket after all since you are a Steeler's fan. Give me a minute."

He came back with a warning telling me how much it's worth. I'm here to tell you. Fuck Geico. Switching to the Steelers can save you 300 dollars or more on a speeding ticket.

As the cop walks away, my nephew says, "You should let your husband drive now." My 6 year old agreed, "Yeah, let daddy drive." Then the other 2 chimed in, "Mommy move over. Let daddy drive." My nephew comes back with, "yeah, you just lost your driving privileges with that." So I let the husband drive.

Here's the issue. Here's the reason why I drive everywhere. Here's the reason why my husband sits in the passenger seat all the time. I'm a control freak. I can't stand it when someone else drives. I have to drive. I get anxiety and panic attacks. I think we are going to die. He is swerving too far to the right. He gets up on people's asses before braking or switching lanes. He didn't really look in the left lane good enough before switching. Quit riding that guy's ass, he keeps stomping on his brakes. We're going to die. We're going to die. I told you people I'm catwoman. Does that not sound like a cat in a car?

My husband at the infamous gas station that I did totally
confuse for a bar because after I had my wine, they played
our song and we danced to it. Right where he's standing here.

So we stopped for gas. College town infamous for block parties, belligerent football fanatics, and partying in general. It's a sin to go there according to some guy from my old church that's a reason I don't go to church anymore. I figured I'd go in and look for some anti-anxiety meds. My options were Benadryl or a sippy cup of Cabernet. So basically, I stopped at a gas station for a cocktail. I stood outside the gas station by the door drinking my wine smoking a cigarette with the fam in the car (avoiding possession of an open container), and yes I made them wait (5 whole minutes). People were walking in and out, college students, party animals right?

Instead of being all "woohoo let's drink" about it, they looked at me like I was a crackhead. The ghetto looking guy wouldn't even make eye contact. So I tried to be funny. These 2 girls walk out with a guy lagging behind and I'm like, "Yeah, the husband is driving. I can't ride with his driving sober." Apparently, I'm not funny. They just looked at each other and walked away really fast. FUCK YOU college students being all serious and maturity snooty. You'll crack. When you graduate, you'll be doing 3-somes with random married couples experimenting with drugs because you're too motherfucking uptight for 21. I've seen it happen to a lot of people. It's not like they were enrolled into Harvard or anything. They should leave and go to Harvard or something because they are making that town look bad. They are killing the reputation alumni for years worked so hard to achieve.

So we leave there. The wine was exactly what I needed. I was relaxed and happy for a good 20 minutes, and then I clonked out. This is why I don't usually drink wine for fun because it always wears off too fast. So then I woke up 20 minutes out of Pittsburgh. I woke up the kids so they could see it.

It's really neat how it happens. You are driving down the road, and you see stuff that looks like suburbia and businesses like the Sprint store, a billboard... then country for a second and then another exit of some lights here and there. You go in this tunnel and as soon as you exit the tunnel, the world lights up like fireworks, downtown Pittsburgh. Bridges, tall buildings, all lit up beautiful.

So basically, you are driving. Darkness. Boring stuff. Darkness. Boring stuff. Tunnel. Hold your breath. Make a wish. and

We did not take this fabulous picture obviously.

It's a magical I couldn't refuse my children.

We got a little lost finding the hotel. Humans amaze me with the whole invention of GPS and stuff, but we are still pretty fucking stupid and useless when it comes to cataloging information. The map came from some place showing the location of the hotels. I can't remember if I ganked it from Google Search or from hotels.com, but it was off by a block and wrong street name and what not. Whatever. We found it. Eventually. It was a fun drive otherwise. It was just late.

We get in the hotel, and the suite was sweet. The kids went to bed and right back to sleep. The guy working there probably thought I smoked crack too. That's okay. He didn't judge me for it.

My girls in their bed

My nephew in the sofa bed.

My husband drinking beer in the kitchen. 

Wasn't this a fabulous idea? It's a hair thingy and drink holder for while you shower, or poop.

PART III of this post Here